Social Work Redifined – My Social Media Job @ btrax

Finding your path in life is what it’s all about.  I spent years in the high-tech semiconductor industry doing engineering /marketing and social media was just a hobby.  Recently, I got the opportunity to turn my hobby into a career. Of course, this opportunity came through social networking and social media.

My name is Greg.  I run the Social Media here for btrax and can’t be happier.

The picture above tells the story of my job – You need the ability to multi-task, invest time,  network and drink a lot of caffeine.

My Social Media Career Recipe

Social media is an interesting mix of career ingredients as it spans the range of PR, Marketing, and a little bit of mad scientist .

Social media PR requires in your blogs, tweets or wall postings that you  say something relevant to those in your community to give them a good impression of your company.  I have to speak in a more natural tone in contrast to the corporate communications style.

Social media marketing comes from understanding of your company, your industry as well as your client and their business.   I find setting up promotional campaigns for clients through social media requires not only requires knowledge of the market, it requires a great deal of creativity as well.

A mad scientist needs to be a little fearless, confident and a little off-center to be creative.   I have to come up with a wild concept, try out the idea and test to see if the idea resonated with the audience.  If it did-you’re a hero.  If it didn’t- hold down the power button for a few seconds to reboot.

Cultural and Organizational Melting Pot

I work with a lot of people from Japan, China, Thailand, as well as US.  We seemed to be interlinked as all of us have cultural or work background connected with US, Japan or China in some way.

Before btrax, I came from a Fortune 500 company in a mature, vertical B2B market.  The cultural theme at btrax is helping the community- internally and externally.  I have found more of a “can-do” attitude and your efforts and effects are seen and felt more readily.  Very refreshing.

My social media isn’t about the numbers

I have observed that collecting a lot of friends or followers seems to be the modern social arms race.   Like squirrels we seem to hurry to gather friends and followers.  In our B2B model, I need to search for followers or friends that turn into  long term partners or clients by engaging in virtual conversation.  Sometimes not easy in the social world autobahn.

Facebook and Twitter are just two different beasts and my approach has to be different with each one.   This also applies to our clients approach to social media.   I connect with the world more than in the past working on client campaigns touching consumers.

My job of exploring this daily changing new frontier (and how to apply in practical ways for clients) is both challenging and satisfying…afterall finding something you are passionate about is half the battle in life!

photo by Nan Palmero